Glass-Steagall must be restored

In "JPMorgan Chase's CEO sounds off on regulation, growth of institution" (Business, Aug. 7), Jamie Dimon said we shouldn't restore the federal Glass-Steagall Act because Australia and Canada have supposedly done alright without such a law.

I disagree.

America is a sparsely developed and grossly underpopulated British former colony; it became the world's leading industrial and commercial banking system originated by George Washington's treasury secretary, Alexander Hamilton. The 1933 Glass-Steagall Act was a return to Hamilton's principles of national banking after Wall Street had taken the country astray in the 1920s, leading to collapse.

Dimon and fellow bankers did that again after Glass-Steagall's repeal in 1998, with the catastrophic result. Re-enactment of the "American System" Glass-Steagall legislation should have been accomplished by now. It prevented government-insured commercial bank deposits from being used by speculation by investment firms.

Three bills to restore Glass-Steagall are pending in Congress. Glass-Steagall memorial resolutions are pending in 26 state legislatures; consideration of it has gone worldwide (including four such bills in Italy's parliament. Congressman Rodney Alexander, R-Ruston, is co-sponsor of said legislation.

Today, nearly five years after the bailout, Dimon says his firm - which just agreed to a $500 million fine for California electricity price manipulation - doesn't need Glass-Steagall. Dodd-Frank works for him, comparing the fine to what Enron and its chief executives ultimately faced.

Glass-Steagall didn't allow banks to own and speculate with commodities, power plants, oil tankers and metals warehouses. It would have prevented JPMorgan Chase's electricity ventures. Detroit, Philadelphia and other cities are being bankrupted by interest-rate "swaps" based on banker-rigged LIBOR rates. Banks could not have sold those swaps under Glass-Steagall.

If they had not been sold by a bank floating it municipal bonds, what city would have bought swaps?

Fred Huenefeld

Monroe

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Glass-Steagall must be restored

In 'JPMorgan Chase's CEO sounds off on regulation, growth of institution' (Business, Aug. 7), Jamie Dimon said we shouldn't restore the federal Glass-Steagall Act because Australia and Canada have